


Mad World

by Icka M Chif (mischif)



Series: Making Hats [3]
Category: Alice in Wonderland (2010)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-03-22
Updated: 2010-03-22
Packaged: 2017-10-08 05:32:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/73204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mischif/pseuds/Icka%20M%20Chif
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Follows 'Amore'. Alice is always late.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mad World

  
There is a place, like no place on Earth.  
A land full of wonder, mystery, and danger.  
And some say to survive it, you need to be as mad as a Hatter.  
Alice is not a Hatter. And she is on Earth, not some illogical but strangely beautiful place.  
She is, however, quite mad.  
She dreams each night, such dreams. When she was younger, it was the same dream, over and over again. Falling, a rabbit in a brocade waistcoat, a blue caterpillar, and a pair of strange round twins.  
Alice dreams of them still, but now there are new dreams, new characters. Sometimes there's a woman, a woman with skin and hair like snow. She's gentle, with a peaceful healing aura tinged with sorrow. The Rabbit is with her, and so is the Dormouse.  
The Dormouse doesn't like Alice much.  
There's also a creature, a monstrous creature that looks like a leopard crossed with a bear, with a mouth like a shark's. She should be afraid of it, it doesn't smell good and there's bits of blood on its paws, but somehow she's confident, if not friendly with it.  
There is another monster, one that she is not so friendly. It is large and black, with glowing eyes. Large claws, purple blood. She hears a voice in her head sometimes when she takes it in, almost like a Scottish brogue, but not quite.  
'_ Beware the Jabberwock, my son!  
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!'_  
She sees herself sometimes, fighting this 'Jabberwock'. She wins by cutting of its head, looking down from a high place at a man with hair like fire, who appears to be horrified to find himself in the midst of a death blow of a dark man with a heart eyepatch.  
'_ One, two! One, two! And through and through  
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!'_  
The enormous ugly head hits the ground and Alice is glad, not because she has killed, but because she has kept the fire-haired man from sullying his hands with blood. For some reason, she does not wish to see the strange man as anything but gentle. She wishes to see him smiling at all times.  
'_ He left it dead, and with its head  
He went galumphing back.'_  
The man with hair like fire wears a battered top hat and mis-matched clothes. Sometimes trousers, sometimes a kilt with striped socks. He has large green eyes that stare into her, as if he could grab onto her with just his gaze. Alice wishes she could remember his name, but it is illusive.  
Alice hears his voice sometimes, just one word. It is a hesitant, broken hearted sound.  
'Stay.'  
She knows she cannot, despite however much she wishes to. There are questions she must answer and things she's late to do.  
Alice is always late.  
It's like a nagging sense in the back of her head, the passing of time. Too fast, too fast, too slow, not fast enough. Time is rushing past her and she's constantly running out of enough time to do everything she feels that she needs to.  
Her tirade back in May, the strange day Hamish attempted to propose to her helped a lot. She doesn't know where half the stuff she said came from, but it is true, so she doesn't dwell on it.  
Margaret learned about Lowell the next day anyway. Apparently he didn't heed warnings well.  
She spends the summer learning from Lord Ascot, learning all she needs to know as an apprentice. She is a fast learner, much to his pleasure and delight. She talks circles around the other apprentices and people in their industry, exceeding all of his expectations. It is hard to explain but there isn't much… _muchness_ to many of the people around her.  
Alice leaves four months after that fateful day, in early in September on her ship that she has been helping to make ready. She says her good-byes, and gets well wishes in return from her family and friends who see her go. _'Fairfarren'_ she tells them, much to their bemused confusion. '_May you travel far under fair skies_'.  
A blue butterfly she knows and doesn't know visits her as well. _Absolem_ her mind whispers as she greets the butterfly before he flies off. He has reached the end of one life and is starting on another. It's somehow fitting.  
Her ship is a fast clipper, named 'Wonder'. She pronounces it 'Under', the vague memory a rich aristocratic voice scolding her for getting the name of something or another wrong making her smile when she does.  
Wonder has a mascot for good luck, as do most good ships. It's a white rabbit in a blue brocade coat. He too, is perpetually late. The ship is not.  
Alice has seen many interesting things since she became mad. She has seen the sharp toothed smiling crocodiles in Egypt, chatted with the dark skinned natives of Morocco, and has breathed the exotic spiced air of Bombay. She has met tigers, sleek and powerful, prowling their cages and not been afraid to meet their golden gaze. She has danced with cobras to the sound of a melodic flute and they do not bite her.  
Her crew is wary of her, and almost overly protective, all at once. She has no fear, according to them.  
How can she? She looks at them and laughs, having seen much more terrifying things. What is a Tiger in comparison to a Bandersnatch? A Cobra to a Jabberwocky?  
Even Australia, with its strange and unusual creatures do not startle her. It is the fact that the animals do not talk that sometimes confounds her. The wind, the sea, the cries of the birds that fly above, they talk to her sometimes. Her crew thought her mad, the first time she warned of a surprise storm. Now they listen to her warnings.  
Sometimes it's a useful thing, being mad. _Gallymoggers_, a voice laughs in her ear. Bonkers, she corrects.  
The best people are mad.  
She asks people her riddle and gets no good answers. 'Because both have ink-stained quills' is the first response she gets to answer why a raven is like a writing-desk.  
It's warm day in November when her reflection in the mirror looks at her and holds up the rabbit's pocketwatch. 'Halfway there'.  
"Where?"  
But her reflection doesn't say.  
Time runs faster the closer they get to Hong Kong. The Falcon set a record from London to Hong Kong in a mere 97 days a few years earlier. The previous year, the Taeping did it in 94 days. The Wonder is a good ship, her captain and sailors are more worried about her safety than speed records, and they make it to Hong Kong in January, a respectable four and a half months later.  
Hong Kong, according to the people she talked to in the busy period before she left London, is like a different world.  
It's foreign and new to Alice, but not another world.  
She talks to the people she needs to talk to, scares a few people, amuses others. Business is a Game, and as a Game, it has rules. She does business with the ones that are amused by her as they play by similar rules. They have _muchness_. She smiles and thanks them, learning new words, new cultures, and trying new foods. She doesn't flinch at some of the dishes that send her captain and sailors cringing, even when they smell absolutely _frumious_ and make her want to gag.  
Nothing tastes quite as bad as _Pishsalver_. And she's quite sure that there are no buttered fingers in any of the dishes.  
She has yet to find _Upelkuchen_, although she has a great deal of fun trying various cakes in her attempt to find one that tastes similar. None make her grow, although she's not quite sure why cake would make her grow taller. Cake is supposed to be fabulously unhealthy and make one grow wider.  
Alice asks a man who is known for being wise why a raven is like a writing-desk. He smiles and asks what the sound of one hand clapping is. She does not know and neither does he.  
It is alright.  
Time slips by faster than ever and suddenly it is April and the Wonder is leaving to return to London, her business done, the holds full of tea and silks. The Captain and crew are somewhat disappointed that they'll be missing 'The Great Tea Race'. Nine clippers, their bellies full, are racing from Fuzhou, just up the country from them in Hong Kong, to London, starting at the end of May. The sailors know which ships are serious about the race and the debate is fierce over who shall win, the Ariel, the Fiery Cross, the Serica, or the much vaunted Taeping.  
The Captain cheers up the crew by saying that they can beat the racing ships to London, see them as they come in. The betting is fierce and makes Alice giggle, as they sometimes try hide the friendly debate about it from her.  
It feels as if they have barely made it to the Southern Hemisphere when time finally completely slips through her fingers and she knows that she has run out of time. It is one year exactly since Hamish attempted to propose to her. She spends a day in correspondence as her reflection looks on, reminding her to write to her Mother, and Margaret, as well as Lord Ascot, thanking him for his patronage and asking him to take care of her Mother with the proceeds of the contracts that she has just made.  
She spends the next day roaming the ship, as is her wont. The ship's mascot looks at her and impatiently taps his pocket watch before staring out to sea once more. She looks around, but none of the sailors saw the rabbit do it. She sighs to herself and wanders some more, not feeling like falling through a dark hole again.  
The rest of the day is uneventful until tea, which she serves herself in her room. Her reflection in the looking glass moves as she sits before the mirror, holding up a pocket watch. The hands are frozen.  
Until the second hand abruptly moves. Tick.  
Tick.  
Tick.  
Time is up.  
Her reflection fades away, to be replace by the woman with hair and skin like snow from her dreams. A Queen, her mind corrects, feeling as if a fog is being lifted from it. The White Queen's lovely dark lips curl up into a smile. "What is your choice?" The White Queen asks, her voice soft and melodic.  
'Stay', the man with hair the colour of fire had whispered in her ear while he stood on a battlefield that does not exist on Earth. It is her choice.  
She couldn't. Not then. She had to answer Hamish' question, she needed to take care of her Mother and sister, she wished to find help for Aunt Imogene, and she had to conclude Father's business plans. She needed to find her own life, her own path.  
And she has.  
It is as simple as that.  
"My choice was not to leave." Alice holds her head up high to meet the Queen's gaze. "My choice was to leave and **return**."  
The White Queen smiles and this time it is one of happiness. "You have concluded your business there?"  
"Yes." Alice says, reaching through the looking glass. It soft, mist like, and she can feel it pulling on her hair and clothing as she falls through, leaving her room aboard the ship behind, with the door locked and the windows tied shut with cord. They will wonder.  
Good.  
The Queen offers her a hand up, aiding Alice to her feet as she gawks at the white castle with its chess-like motif. It is lovely and full of peace. Alice's hair is unbound, tumbling down her back like an uncivilised person, but she prefers it that way and does not regret the loss of hair pins. "I am glad to see you again, My Champion." The White Queen murmurs. _'Mirana of Marmoreal'_, her mind corrects. "Tarrant will be pleased as well, he has missed you terribly."  
Who? She almost asks, but refrains. A white rabbit in a blue brocade waistcoat arrives, excited to see her and escorts her through the castle, the Queen saying that she will see Alice later.  
The white rabbit, 'Sir Nivens McTwisp, Esquire, Junior, the 57th' as he proudly introduces himself when she murmurs that she cannot seem to remember his name, takes her to the base of a tower, where there is a room full of fabric. There is some clothing, but mostly it is full of hats.  
And her fire-haired man, working steadily on something on the sewing machine. He mutters to himself as he works and does not seem to notice when she steps inside, finding a seat on a hatbox and watching him work. He rambles for ages, as she drinks his presence in, soaks up his words like a flower seeking sunlight. He talks about hats for Bayard and Mallymkun and the Cheshire Cat and he's thinking about making some for the Pawns, what does she think?  
She laughs, pure delight and joy. "I think you're mad." She says fondly. He is. As mad as a Hatter.  
He smiles in return, but it's somehow not quite... _there_. She knows him, and she doesn't. "Tell me." He asks. "Why is a raven like a writing-desk?"  
She tilts her head to the side. Ink Stained Quills? Because they can both produce a few notes? Because there is a 'B' in both and a 'N' in neither? What is the sound of one hand clapping? "I give up." She says instead. "What's the answer?"  
He leans forward, as if to give her a serious and grave answer, and she finds herself shifting closer. "I haven't the slightest idea." He says, then giggles.  
She cannot help but to laugh. She cannot remember his name, but she knows him, trusts him. Sitting next to him is like finding a limb that she has been missing for the past year and she basks in his presence. "I'll tell you a secret." Alice whispers as she leans closer still, able to breathe him in, the scent of fabric, silks, cotton and wool. He smells like good tea, fresh crumpets and like a man. There are thimbles on his finger tips and on a whim, she slips one off his finger and puts it on her fingertip. It is slightly warm and feels good. "I've missed you."  
His response is unexpected. He blinks as if he is waking from a dream, staring at her as if he has never seen her before. It's worrisome and she puts a hand on his arm, holding on to him. "Hatter?"  
Hatter, that is his name. No, not his name. His title, his profession. Tarrant, the White Queen called him. They have names and titles here. He stares at her hand, touching it as if he is afraid that she will shatter at the lightest touch.  
He has lost some of his muchness. She does not know how she knows this, but she does.  
"You are here." He says dumbly, as if suffering from a great shock.  
"Of course." Has he seen her somewhere else? It is the Rabbit that has travelled to her world, not him.  
The fire returns to his eyes. "Wait right here." He says, his words a mumbled rush as he runs off, quickly going through his hats. They go flying through the air, landing all over the place, like a snowstorm made of headwear. She watches as he tears through his room until he suddenly stops and stills, having found whatever it was that he was looking for, looking nervous and almost afraid that he has.  
His expression shifts back to confident as quickly as he had torn through his hats as he turns on his heel to face her. He hides what ever he has found behind his back, shielding it from her view. "For you." He says and she realises that he has made something for her, a hat. After all, he is a Hatter.  
She straightens up, closing her eyes to extend the suspense.  
He gives a small sigh of what is obviously relief, moving whatever it is from behind her back and placing it on her head. It doesn't fit like hat, nor is it heavy like one, almost like a headband, only over the hair instead of under in the back. "Perfect." He whispers, and she privately mourns as he steps back. He's staring at her with those wide green eyes of his with the long red lashes, looking pleased.  
Hatter then startles, reaching for mirror, knocking even more hats to the ground as he holds it up so she can see.  
It's a crown, a small round coronet, barely visible other than a sparkle of silver in her pale gold hair. She touches it with a fingertip, feeling the smoothness of it, like touching the surface of a still body of water.  
"Hatter..." It's almost too much. She hasn't the words to express what she feels and grabs his hand, holding on. He takes a deep breath, almost shivering as his eyes drift shut, as if he is overwhelmed as well. "Thank you." The words are insufficient, they don't express all that this mad person makes her feel, but it is what she can offer to him.  
Somehow, he understands. He offers his other hand to her. "You are here?" He asks, almost eagerly. "To stay?" It's a crazy, mad question, one that she has waited a year and a day to happily answer.  
She takes his hand, the two of them clasping hands as if afraid that the other will disappear. "Yes." She smiles at him. She is here. To stay in this strange and wonderful place.  
She isn't late any longer. She's precisely on time to be where she wants to be.  
He smiles back and she can see his muchness return.  
There is a place, like no place on Earth.  
A land full of wonder, mystery, and danger.  
And some say to survive it, you need to be as mad as a Hatter.  
Alice is not a Hatter.  
But luckily, she does know one.  
-fin-

**Author's Note:**

>   
> According to a copy the 2007 script, the movie takes place in 1865. The first book, 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' takes place on 4 May, and 'Through the Looking-Glass' takes place on 4 November, in reference to the 'mirror' theme that is so common in the second book. So therefore, I'm using 4 May 1865 as the date that Hamish proposed.  
> 'A year and a day' is a common contractual theme in fairy tales. Alice spends 3 days, 2 nights in Underland, 3 being another common magical number.  
> Alice's problem with time is both a reference to the White Rabbit's being late and that the fact that in the first book, Time has stopped for both the Mad Hatter and the March Hare.  
> The Great Tea Race of 1866 is a historical event, because I'm a history geek like that. Wiki it!  
> Opening and closing are based off the Hatter's quotes in the trailers.


End file.
